Timmy Mallett
Where do we start with Timmy Mallett? That’s the question. To children of the 1980s and 1990s the permanently cheery one is up there with Chris Tarrant, Keith Chegwin, Noel Edmonds and Pat Sharp as being at the vanguard of riotous, anarchic kids TV programme-fronting. Rarely seen in public without his oversized pink foam ‘Mallett’s Mallet’ and sporting the type of spectacle frames that would seem ostentatious adorning notorious glass wearers, Elton John and Dame Edna Everedge’s facades as well as retina-damaging shirts, Mallett was pretty much everywhere for what seemed like an eternity. In a good way, obviously. But both Mallett and his, er, mallet disappeared without trace pretty much as rapidly as they knocked an unsuspecting TV audience for seven in the first place, and we assumed like everyone else Mallett would just rock up unexpectedly on a celeb reality TV show a couple of decades later. i.e. about now. The truth of the matter was Mallett was busying himself with his painting. And it turns out that he’s quite the dab hand.
He may have swapped his ‘Mallett’s Mallet’ for ‘Mallett’s Pallette’ (sorry) yet the zany personality has picked up his career second coming in much the same fashion in which he left his former TV presenting career by being defiantly colourful and larger than life. Which makes it all the more surprising that the normally ebullient and self-promoting Mallett has uncharacteristically hidden his artistic light under the bushel to date. Which is a terrible shame, as Mallett the artist is a lot more palatable than Mallett the (with the greatest of respect) slightly irritating star of TV. Mallet unapologetically loves painting, and sure knows his way around a canvas and set of brushes if his impressive and seductive back catalogue is anything to go by. Which of course, it is. Mallet cites his chief inspirations as Great Britain itself, and moreover those things that make it great, whilst numerous sorties around the world have left indelible creative influences on his artistic mind-set and approach to his subject. And when we say the world, we mean the world. Australia, Morocco, Canada, Italy, France, Spain, America, the Baltics, etc; the list goes on and the accumulative Air Miles must afford Mallett more than a free kettle for his circumnavigating.
So where did it all begin in Mallett’s case? As it happens, the answer is from a very early age, which led him to study History of Art as part of his Art and History degree awarded by Warwick University. Born in Marple, near Stockport in Greater Manchester in 1955, this publically perceived recent transformation into a bona fida artist didn’t just happen overnight. Nor is it a mid-life whim for the 57-year old Mallett. Expanding on his love of art as a child, he goes on to describe how he used to hone his rudimentary art skills in the close company of his father – himself an amateur artist – who loved to experiment with colours. In a recent interview Mallett talks of his father’s insistence that he practised with oil paints and the consequent excitement of getting the oils, the canvas and mixing the paints together, and even the smell. To Mallett’s mind, this was proper painting. He goes on to recall family holidays and always packing his paint sets, intent on going off to paint the vistas he was met with and how both his and his father’s paintings depicting their holiday destinations would hang from the walls of the family home.What’s more, Mallett was fortunate enough to have a good art teacher at school who encouraged him to develop his skillset and helped him secure an Art A-Level before embarking on his aforementioned degree course.
At the height of Mallett’s TV career, he never lost sight of his passion for painting, more often than not taking his preferred watercolours on location with him and actively constructing his compositions between shots and camera takes. For his part, Mallett fervently believes that there’s alchemy to his personal application of art. He also stresses that being engrossed in every subject is key and that colour and the contrasts of light and shade in relation to colour is paramount to the balance of each individual piece. Animals, murals, waterways, portraiture, coastal, landscapes; Mallett effortlessly covers one helluva spectrum in all honesty, and obviously paints for the sheer, unadulterated pleasure of it now as much as ever. Of late he’s shown a particular fascination for the very British, yet increasingly rare, red public telephone boxes that used to ubiquitously populate the length and breadth of the UK, as well as the equally iconic red pillar boxes. Dismayed at their dwindling numbers, Mallett has busied himself committing his visual interpretation of them to canvas. His portrait paintings have also received a brush with success, especially in 2002 when Mallett completed a series of some 50 portraits of not just fellow residents of his home town in Berkshire, yet household names like Lorraine Kelly, Ulrika Jonsson, Jim Rosenthal, Wendy Craig and Sir Clive Woodward as part of HRH Queen Elizabeth’s Golden Jubilee commemorations at the time.
In terms of inspirations and influences, Mallett admits that aside from his father’s and school’s teachings, he learned much about painting techniques by observing the works of the 17th Century Dutch Masters Vermeer and Hobbema, alongside the Impressionists – with Monet being a specific name check – whilst also quoting the pictorial body of works of classic English painter, Turner, as well as the artists belonging to the famed Newlyn School movement that was prevalent in Cornwall. Now living in Cookham in Berkshire with his family, and where he has his studio, Mallett today paints chiefly in acrylics and oils and showcases his collections and individual compositions on a regular basis. Peer and industry acknowledgment are both in plentiful supply, with the striking up of a keen artistic friendship with celebrated artist and fellow TV presenter, Rolf Harris in recent years, while in 2012 Mallett was recognised by the Fine Art Trade Guild by the awarding of their Best Selling Up and Coming Artist gong.
He may have swapped his ‘Mallett’s Mallet’ for ‘Mallett’s Pallette’ (sorry) yet the zany personality has picked up his career second coming in much the same fashion in which he left his former TV presenting career by being defiantly colourful and larger than life. Which makes it all the more surprising that the normally ebullient and self-promoting Mallett has uncharacteristically hidden his artistic light under the bushel to date. Which is a terrible shame, as Mallett the artist is a lot more palatable than Mallett the (with the greatest of respect) slightly irritating star of TV. Mallet unapologetically loves painting, and sure knows his way around a canvas and set of brushes if his impressive and seductive back catalogue is anything to go by. Which of course, it is. Mallet cites his chief inspirations as Great Britain itself, and moreover those things that make it great, whilst numerous sorties around the world have left indelible creative influences on his artistic mind-set and approach to his subject. And when we say the world, we mean the world. Australia, Morocco, Canada, Italy, France, Spain, America, the Baltics, etc; the list goes on and the accumulative Air Miles must afford Mallett more than a free kettle for his circumnavigating.
So where did it all begin in Mallett’s case? As it happens, the answer is from a very early age, which led him to study History of Art as part of his Art and History degree awarded by Warwick University. Born in Marple, near Stockport in Greater Manchester in 1955, this publically perceived recent transformation into a bona fida artist didn’t just happen overnight. Nor is it a mid-life whim for the 57-year old Mallett. Expanding on his love of art as a child, he goes on to describe how he used to hone his rudimentary art skills in the close company of his father – himself an amateur artist – who loved to experiment with colours. In a recent interview Mallett talks of his father’s insistence that he practised with oil paints and the consequent excitement of getting the oils, the canvas and mixing the paints together, and even the smell. To Mallett’s mind, this was proper painting. He goes on to recall family holidays and always packing his paint sets, intent on going off to paint the vistas he was met with and how both his and his father’s paintings depicting their holiday destinations would hang from the walls of the family home.What’s more, Mallett was fortunate enough to have a good art teacher at school who encouraged him to develop his skillset and helped him secure an Art A-Level before embarking on his aforementioned degree course.
At the height of Mallett’s TV career, he never lost sight of his passion for painting, more often than not taking his preferred watercolours on location with him and actively constructing his compositions between shots and camera takes. For his part, Mallett fervently believes that there’s alchemy to his personal application of art. He also stresses that being engrossed in every subject is key and that colour and the contrasts of light and shade in relation to colour is paramount to the balance of each individual piece. Animals, murals, waterways, portraiture, coastal, landscapes; Mallett effortlessly covers one helluva spectrum in all honesty, and obviously paints for the sheer, unadulterated pleasure of it now as much as ever. Of late he’s shown a particular fascination for the very British, yet increasingly rare, red public telephone boxes that used to ubiquitously populate the length and breadth of the UK, as well as the equally iconic red pillar boxes. Dismayed at their dwindling numbers, Mallett has busied himself committing his visual interpretation of them to canvas. His portrait paintings have also received a brush with success, especially in 2002 when Mallett completed a series of some 50 portraits of not just fellow residents of his home town in Berkshire, yet household names like Lorraine Kelly, Ulrika Jonsson, Jim Rosenthal, Wendy Craig and Sir Clive Woodward as part of HRH Queen Elizabeth’s Golden Jubilee commemorations at the time.
In terms of inspirations and influences, Mallett admits that aside from his father’s and school’s teachings, he learned much about painting techniques by observing the works of the 17th Century Dutch Masters Vermeer and Hobbema, alongside the Impressionists – with Monet being a specific name check – whilst also quoting the pictorial body of works of classic English painter, Turner, as well as the artists belonging to the famed Newlyn School movement that was prevalent in Cornwall. Now living in Cookham in Berkshire with his family, and where he has his studio, Mallett today paints chiefly in acrylics and oils and showcases his collections and individual compositions on a regular basis. Peer and industry acknowledgment are both in plentiful supply, with the striking up of a keen artistic friendship with celebrated artist and fellow TV presenter, Rolf Harris in recent years, while in 2012 Mallett was recognised by the Fine Art Trade Guild by the awarding of their Best Selling Up and Coming Artist gong.